Following our last two posts - and in case you need a reminder - the West Bank is an area of land located on the west bank of the River Jordan and bounded by Israel to the north, west and south. To its east lies Jordan.

It has been occupied by Israel since the 1967 Middle East war, but decades of difficult on-off talks between Israel and the Palestinians - both of whom assert rights there - have left its final status unresolved.

Between 2.1 million and 3 million (sources vary) Palestinian Arabs live in the West Bank under both limited self-rule and Israeli military rule.

The West Bank - excluding East Jerusalem - is also home to some 430,000 Israeli Jews who live in more than 130 settlements built under Israel's occupation.

Image source, .

Four Palestinian men have been killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank today, the Israeli military and Palestinian ministry of health operating in the occupied territory say.

The four are reported to have been in a car driving through the city of Tulkarem when the soldiers opened fire. The Israeli military said the men were members of a Hamas cell that was behind numerous shooting attacks.

The occupied West Bank is separate to the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. A total of 152 Palestinians have been killed in in the West Bank since 7 October, the health ministry there says.

A commission for Palestinian prisoners says 70 Palestinians were arrested overnight, including prominent activist Ahed Tamimi, as we reported in our last post.

The Commission of Detainees' Affairs says more than 2,000 Palestinians have been arrested in the West Bank since 7 October, amid escalating violence in the territory.

Image source, Getty Images

Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi has been arrested by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank.

Tamimi, 22, was detained overnight in the village of Nabi Saleh, the Palestinian Prisoners' Society says.

Israel's military told the AFP news agency she was suspected of "inciting violence and terrorist activities".

Meanwhile Israeli media reported that Tamimi was arrested in connection with a post on Instagram that threatened to "slaughter" Jewish settlers in occupied territories.

It's not the first time Tamimi has been arrested. She was convicted, when she was a teenager, in 2018 on charges of assaulting a soldier and incitement to violence in a video that went viral.

Nadia Ragozhina
Live reporter

Image source, Courtesy of Elinor Shahar

Adva Adar has been telling me about her 85-year-old grandmother, Yafa, who was kidnapped by Hamas and taken into Gaza on a golf cart.

But Yafa is not the only member of Adva's family caught up in the 7 October attacks.

Her cousin Tamir is also missing. He left his wife and two children in their shelter at the kibbutz Nir Oz and went to protect his community when he heard that Hamas gunmen were on the ground.

At 08:00 he called his wife. “He didn’t think that they were going to make it,” Adva tells me. “He told her not to open the door to anyone and he said his goodbye.”

He has not been heard from since. The family don’t know if he was taken to Gaza, murdered or injured.

Adva also has a grandfather, an aunt, and another cousin, who survived the attacks.

Her grandfather, Yoram Adar, "aged 50 years in a day," she says. "He was scared to leave the hospital...scared is not an emotion I would have ever used to describe him in the past."

She tells me her family "have nothing to go back to," adding:

Image source, Reuters

It's approaching early evening in Israel and Gaza, where the war between Hamas and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) rages on. If you're just joining us, or need a recap, here are some of the latest developments:

• Gaza's health ministry - run by Hamas - says more than 10,000 people have now been killed in Gaza since Israel launched its retaliatory offensive (some politicians have questioned the accuracy of the figures, but the World Health Organization says it believes the numbers are reliable)
• The milestone comes after heavy air strikes and explosions in northern Gaza overnight, with Israel saying its fighter jets had attacked 450 targets in the territory over the past day

• Around 200 people were killed as a result, according to the director of Gaza City's largest hospital Al-Shifa, who says people carried dead bodies to the hospital by donkey as communications outages left people unable to reach ambulance services
• The US says it's working "very aggressively" to get aid into Gaza, on the same day that Jordan and Israel coordinated a humanitarian aid air drop into the enclave

• Meanwhile the Rafah crossing into Egypt has today reopened, allowing some injured Palestinians and foreign nationals to leave
• The families of more than 200 hostages being held by Hamas have continued to hold vigils and demonstrations to highlight the plight of their loved ones - you can read more on those being held here

Earlier, an airstrike interrupted the BBC's Gaza correspondent's live report on Radio 4's World At One programme.

Rushdi Abualouf was describing the situation on the ground when an airstrike was heard above.

Listen to the clip here.

Image source, Reuters

As we've been reporting, the crossing that connects Egypt to the southern Gaza Strip has today reopened to allow foreign nationals and badly injured Palestinians the chance to leave the enclave.

Hundreds have already crossed but many more remain stuck in Gaza, which is now largely a warzone. The crossing, called Rafah, has been opening intermittently since 21 October, but initially only to let humanitarian aid in. Last Wednesday, the first foreign passport-holders were allowed to leave Gaza through the crossing.

Hamas and Egypt normally exercise control over who can pass through, but Rafah was shut following retaliatory strikes on Gaza after Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October.

There are two other border crossings from and into the Gaza Strip - Erez and Kerem Shalom - both are shut at the moment.

As such, Rafah is now the only way in or out of Gaza.

• For more on its importance, head here

The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt has today reopened to foreign nationals and badly injured Palestinians seeking medical attention.

Rafah has been the only crossing open into and out of Gaza since Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October and the Israeli military started its retaliatory strikes. It's where humanitarian aid has made its way into the Palestinian enclave.

In recent days, the border has been used by foreign passport holders to get out of the Strip, if they have had their names published on official lists of people cleared to cross.

Hundreds have so far made it out of Gaza, but thousands remain.

Image source, .

With the war now in its fifth week, events are being held in Israel to highlight the plight of 242 women, children and the elderly being held hostage by Hamas in Gaza.

They were taken as part of Hamas's attack on Israel on 7 October.

Here's a small selection of images - including one of those demonstrations - we're seeing from across Israel today.

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Jalaa MAREY / AFP

Image source, REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

Jordan has air dropped urgent medical and pharmaceutical aid to the Jordanian field hospital in the Gaza Strip.

King Abdullah of Jordan tweeted: "We will always be there for our Palestinian brethren."

Watch the 25 second video below:

Image source, Getty Images

The number of people killed in Gaza since Israel began bombing the territory has now reached 10,022, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.

The figure comes after a night of intense Israeli strikes, with the Israeli military saying they hit hundreds of targets including a Hamas military compound.

The director of the largest hospital in Gaza City told the BBC earlier that some 200 people were killed.

A group of UN humanitarian agencies and charities have said the "horrific killings" of civilians in Gaza are an "outrage". Thousands of children are believed to be among the dead.

Some politicians, including US President Joe Biden, have questioned the accuracy of the Gaza health ministry's figures.

When asked about this, the World Health Organization said they believed the numbers were reliable. Like other government agencies in Gaza, the health ministry is controlled by Hamas, a proscribed terror group in the UK, US and EU.

Israel launched its attacks on Gaza after Hamas killed more than 1,400 people in Israel and kidnapped more than 200 others on 7 October. The Israeli military says its operation is aimed at destroying Hamas completely.

Image source, Reuters

We heard from US Secretary of State Antony Blinken earlier as he left Turkey, ending his tour of the Middle East.

He said his talks in the region have been focusing on three things - how to expand humanitarian assistance, how to stop the conflict from spreading and also "what we can do to set the conditions for a durable, sustainable, lasting peace of Israelis and Palestinians".

Speaking after talks with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan in Ankara, Blinken also said:

• Aid: The US is working "very aggressively" and in "very concrete ways" to get additional aid into Gaza. He told reporters he'd made "good progress in working to expand that" and they'll see assistance expand significantly "in the days ahead". He said the US shared the concern over the "terrible toll" on the Palestinians in Gaza
• Hostages: We remain "very focused" on the hostages held by Hamas and "making sure we’re doing everything possible to bring them home", he said
• Gaza deaths: Blinken said "we’ve engaged the Israelis on steps they can take to minimise humanitarian casualties"
• Has he accomplished his goal? Blinken told reporters: "All of this is a work in progress." And pressed again, Blinken replied: "Sometimes the absence of something bad happening may not be the most obvious evidence of progress, but it is"

Image source, EPA

The European Union has pledged to increase the aid it sends to Gaza by €25m (£21.7m) - which quadruples EU humanitarian assistance this year.

Speaking on Monday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said they had already tripled their aid three weeks ago - but this increase now means the EU would spend a total of €100m in humanitarian aid in Gaza.

The new assistance will be given to humanitarian organisations to provide life-saving assistance, in particular focusing on water and sanitation, health, food and other essential items.

The EU is the largest foreign donor to the Palestinians – but it is unclear how the additional aid will reach people in Gaza. The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt is how aid has been getting in - but aid agencies say the amount being let through is not enough.

After a night of heavy bombing and an internet blackout in Gaza, the BBC's Rushdi Abualouf says "we are struggling to get credible information".

The director of Gaza City's largest hospital, Al-Shifa, says about 200 people were killed overnight. The Israeli military has since repeated claims that Hamas is using hospitals in northern Gaza for "combat purposes".

But the director of the Hamas-run hospital says this is not true, and it is open to UN inspections.

Watch Rushdi's assessment of the latest strikes below:

Nadia Ragozhina
Live reporter

Image source, Courtesy of Elinor Shahar

On 7 October, Adva Adar's 85-year-old grandmother was kidnapped by Hamas and driven into Gaza in a golf cart - one of more than 200 people taken from Israel that day.

A month later, as the Israeli military pounds Gaza with airstrikes and encircles Gaza City, Adva wants to believe the Israeli military are focused on the hostages' fate.

“If they are doing a ground invasion in Gaza, then they are doing it because this can help bring the hostages back," she tells me on the phone from Israel.

"If I don’t believe it I can’t have hope. And if I can’t have hope, I have no reason to wake up in the morning. I need to believe she will be back."

Adva was supposed to visit her grandmother at the kibbutz Nir Oz with her family on 7 October to mark the Jewish festival of Sukkot.

But at 6.30 that morning her grandmother, Yafa Adar, wrote in the family chat that there was rocket fire and she was in her shelter.

“We asked her to be safe. We couldn’t imagine what was going on,” Adva says. “Other members of my family [at the kibbutz] told me that the terrorists were going from house to house. They were burning the houses, shooting and kidnapping people.”

Adva lost contact with her grandmother - who has health problems and needs medication - by 9am. That evening she watched a Hamas video showing her being taken away.

"I couldn’t believe it was even possible to kidnap an 85-year-old woman from her bed," Adva says. "It is unhuman behaviour, beyond possible.”

Image source, Reuters

Some staff and their family members have been temporarily withdrawn from the British embassy in Lebanon, amid growing tensions in the region.

The Foreign Office pointed to the current "security situation" as the reason behind the move.

It comes as cross-border violence has flared between the Lebanese group Hezbollah and the Israeli military in recent weeks.

Lebanese state media said yesterday that three children and their grandmother had been killed by an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, said this was "in response to the firing of an anti-tank missile that killed an Israeli citizen".

Image source, Reuters

Securing lines of communication in Gaza is very difficult this morning, but overnight we received a voice note from Najla Shawa, which played earlier this morning on BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

She is currently sheltering in Khan Younis after evacuating her home in the north. There are around 60 other people sheltering in the house with her, but they have now run out of some essential items, she said.

"We are now looking for more items in the Khan Younis area - it's very dangerous though, to move, because of the bombings," Shawa said.

"We don't know anything about our homes (in the north), we were told that there are battles there," she added. The last update she received about her house was four days ago, and that it is still standing.

Rushdi Abualouf
Reporting from southern Gaza

Image source, Reuters

It was a very tough night with communication being suspended, mobile phones were off.

The director of Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City says people were carrying dead bodies by donkeys and in their own cars because communication was cut and they couldn't reach ambulance services.

This morning communications were resumed, but still getting information from Gaza City is very hard.

Verifying some of the information is very hard, getting witnesses from the area is also very hard. We are struggling as journalists to get any credible information.

What is Israel doing by cutting Gaza in two?published at 11:10 Greenwich Mean Time 6 November 2023

11:10 GMT 6 November 2023

Paul Adams
Diplomatic correspondent

Last night’s observation by Israel's chief military spokesman, Daniel Hagari, that "today there is Gaza north and Gaza south" confirmed what had started to become apparent in recent days.

When a tank appeared on the main north-south road Salah al-Din, just south of Gaza City, a week ago, it was clear that cutting off the northern third of the Gaza Strip was a major Israeli priority.

Reports over the following days spoke of intense fighting across relatively open terrain between Salah al-Din and the coast.

Buildings in the way, like the Turkish Friendship Hospital, were caught in the crossfire. Nearby Al-Azhar University, with elaborate new buildings funded by Morocco and Saudi Arabia, appears to have been utterly destroyed by airstrikes two days ago.

By the end of last week, Israeli armoured vehicles were spotted within a few hundred metres of the other route south, al-Rasheed, which runs along the coast.

Despite repeated calls on civilians in the north to move south of the Wadi Gaza line for their own safety, it’s clear that Israel will continue to hit what it regards as important targets throughout the Gaza Strip (as Saturday’s strike on Maghazi refugee camp showed).

But the IDF’s main focus is on the densely built-up area of Gaza City and the nearby refugee camps of Jabalia and al-Shati. This, Israel believes, is the main Hamas stronghold.

It’s still urging upwards of 300,000 civilians in the north to leave, but those who won’t or can’t are now living in the midst of a ferocious urban battle.

Rushdi Abualouf
Reporting from southern Gaza

Last night's strikes were very intense. Maybe the biggest in Gaza since the start of this war.

About 450 targets were hit across the Gaza Strip, but the main focus of the strikes were north-west and south-west Gaza where Israel is expanding its ground operation.

After communications resumed this morning, I spoke to the director of Gaza City's Al-Shifa hospital, who said about 200 people were killed in strikes overnight.

He says the hospital is overwhelmed by the number of bodies and injuries - and he says he expects the number of fatalities to go up again.

Image source, .